Power BI Embedded connected to local SQL Server instead of SQL Database Azure?

[shds]

Hi there,

I am looking into ways to most efficiently provide our customer data to those customers and we are focusing on PowerBI. However, it would be too much of a hassle to have our customers sign up for a PowerBI.com account so they can see reports in the cloud.

The next option would be to make use of Power BI Embedded, but from what I am reading in the documentation it seems that the only way to connect your report to a (live) database would be via a populated SQL Database on Azure. Is it possible to use Power BI Embedded in combination with our local SQL Server, just like we are now using the On-premises Data Gateway?

And if not, what other ways would there be to use PowerBI to present our customers with their own data in interactive charts/reports?

[Eric_Zhang]

@shds

So far, there's no gateway or refresh feature in Power BI Embedded, you can vote this idea up.

As a workaround using Power BI, you can either choose

1. re-fresh and re-import the pbix 
2. Load the data from on-premises SQL Server to Azure SQL database via a regular ETL process, import a pbix in DirectQuery mode then.

[shds]

Hi ,thanks for your suggestion, have upvoted the idea!

[Greg_Deckler]

If you do not need RLS then you could use the "Publish to Web" option, not the most secure, but simple.

[shds]

hi smoupre, thanks for your prompt response. 

We do require authentication so Publish to Web wouldn't work unfortunately.

[Greg_Deckler]

You do have the option of using something like Pyramid Analytics Server to publish your Desktop reports to locally. Similar functionality is on the roadmap for SQL Server Reporting Services.

[shds]

We looked into Pyramid Analytics, but that's not a great match in terms of added functionality and price. Do you have some more information about the SSRS option? This sounds like something we could use.